The higher the hair, the closer to God—and the smaller the sunglasses, the closer to It girl–dom, it seems. From May to August of 2017, teeny, tiny, microscopically small sunglasses became the predominant trend for Instagram lovers everywhere. Bella Hadid was oft seen with little, rounded frames resting on the bridge of her nose. Kendall Jenner preferred the angular, Matrix-esque black glasses by her Kendall + Kylie brand. Zoe Kravitz had a summerlong affair with Adam Selman’s cat-eye Le Specs shades. Even Millie Bobbie Brown took to the Teen Choice Awards red carpet in doll-sized Chrome Hearts sunglasses worn with a Kenzo dress. As a devotee of the biggest, darkest, most face-obscuring shades since Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, I am flabbergasted.

My first question: Since tiny sunglasses don’t actually serve the purpose of protecting one’s eyes from the sun—especially if you’re wearing them down on the bridge of your nose—why wear them? Without being pushed high on the bridge, they become a useless accessory, a mere face adornment, like a nose ring without the prick. Stripped of their purpose, what’s the appeal of a teensy spectacle? The answer might be as perplexing as the question. It seems that tiny shades have become the ultimate voyeuristic tool of 2017. To wear miniature specs is to ask to be seen—and to ask to be photographed. They make a close-up selfie slightly more subversive, a stepping-out-of-the-hotel moment more stylish, and turn the red carpet walk into a coy tousle with photographers’ lenses. See me! No don’t! After years of It girls using sunglasses as a defense mechanism against prying eyes and aggressive cameras, the very accessory meant to obscure the wearer has become exactly the opposite.

To understand how we got here, we’ve got to work backwards, starting at the height of the paparazzi era. I’m talking Olsens, Lohans, and Hiltons. In the heyday of aughts-era tabloids, there was no accessory more essential for celebrities than a pair of enormous shades. During their New York University days, the Olsen twins favored dark-tinted Oliver Peoples sunglasses that along with body-consuming flannels, scarves, coats, and Birkins, served to erase the outlines of their bodies and faces in front of paparazzi lenses. Paris Hilton and her then-BFF Nicole Richie loved face-shielding aviators, as did Lindsay Lohan. A-listers preferred the anonymity of black shades too, from Jennifer Aniston to Angelina Jolie to the man in the middle, Brad Pitt. Look back further, and you’ll see that Princess Diana, whose style is already shaping up to be a talking point for Spring 2018, was rarely seen without a big pair of shades.

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But with the dawn of social media in the late aughts came a shift. Instead of hiding from the camera, stars were putting themselves out in front of it. Face-covering accessories of any kind—scarves, hats, or sunglasses—wouldn’t do. Instead of anonymity as the mark of prestige, access became the thing. And to be accessible, well, you need to show your face, both figuratively and literally.

First came the pastel aviators of summer 2016. Seen in shades of rose, azure, and the popular sun-yellow, the slightly ’70s aviators were everywhere. Cara Delevingne had a go-to vintage pair, while her pal Adwoa Aboah preferred a thicker framed style with bright yellow lenses. Next came the colorless, faux optical glasses worn by Kendall Jenner. Even Beyoncé was not immune to the transparent lens, wearing Gucci frames with bee embellishments on her summer vacation with Blue Ivy.

So how’d we make the jump to micro-shades? Like many of fashion’s dominant trends of the moment, I’d trace it back to Demna Gvasalia. At Balenciaga’s Spring 2017 show, the stocking boots weren’t the only item to take off—Gvasalia also sent out small, opaque black sunglasses akin to the ones Trinity wore in The Matrix. For Fall 2017, he doubled down on his small shades proposition, creating angular slivers of sunglasses worn with evening gowns. Two months after that show, Rihanna debuted her own style of slim frames (made by Andy Wolf eyewear) on the red carpet at Cannes. By late May, the Kendall + Kylie style had dropped, and by June, Bella Hadid was nearly inseparable from her Roberi and Fraud shades, cementing the style as this summer’s must-have.

One more question: Where will we go from here? I think we might look to the queen of the voyeurs, Kim Kardashian West, for the answer. Recently, Kim has abandoned wearing sunglasses altogether. All the better to see her.